Flawed identifications are responsible for many wrongful convictions Essay

Flawed identifications are responsible for many wrongful convictions. Why What should be done - Essay Example acknowledging the efforts exerted by organizations like the Innocence Project and the Innocence Commission of Florida that review convictions to ensure rightful castigation of the real suspects while freeing the innocent groups. Innocence Project and Innocence Commission of Florida also advocate for payment and compensation of the wrong convicts among realization of the mistakes. The value of such like compensations depends on the damage caused to the innocent convict and the length of time spent in prison. There are many reasons that explains flawed identification that eventually lead to false testimony against a suspect. The first reasons rely on the short memory of human beings and poor attention abated to transpiring criminal activities. This kind of confusion is prevalent when a witness is presented with two suspects; with one white and the other black. In most cases, individual witness will not be able to differentiate whether the main criminal was black or white in color perhaps due to poor attention and concentration as at the time of the crime. In some cases police officers patrol and make arrests after criminal offences and perhaps take photos of the suspects, release the individual suspects and presents witnesses with various photos to identify the actual perpetrators. Due to the length of time lapse after the crime, witnesses’ memory may have faded away and may not make true identification of the suspect but may only desperately point at the suspect with suspicious f ace. The above descriptions narrow down to the theory of own-race bias effect. According to the theory, human beings encounter difficulty in identifying and recognizing individuals from different races and ethnic groups. The theory portends that human beings can make accurate facial identification and recognition when it comes to differentiating people of their own race and ethic divisions. The demises attached to the flawed identification of criminals make it necessary for the